Russian Fleet in Crimea Occupies Land Without Any Lease Agreements

To date, there is not a single lease for any object or land occupied in the Crimea by the Black Sea Fleet of the Russian Federation.

These agreements do not exist, since initially there was no inventory or assessment of the cost of facilities and land, writes in an article for ZN.UA contributor Volodymyr Kravchenko.

The author recalls that the agreement on payment for the BSF defines the basic parameters of the lease, but the document itself is not a lease. "Inventory is a tool necessary for Ukraine to sign a lease. Property of Ukraine has been in use for 20 years, it wears out, becomes worthless, but we have no information about the price of the property, or its condition," said Director of the Center for International Programs, NOMOS Dmytro Shtyblikov.

Some of the objects used by the Russian sailors are not even listed in Annex № 2 to the Agreement between Ukraine and Russia on the size and parameters of the division of the Black Sea Fleet. These are, in particular, the 13 shore facilities in Sevastopol. Although formally Kiev and Moscow have agreed to hold inventory at the beginning of the 2000s, this process has not been completed, despite the statements of some Ukrainian officials. Russians block this process, not allowing Ukrainian experts to facilities and land, or not recognizing the results of the inventory. At various times, they had a different motivation.

Now negotiators from the Russian side offered an inventory to Kyiv in parallel with the Ukrainian side's repair of the premises occupied parts of the Black Sea Fleet of Russia, writes columnist.

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